Longtime radio play-by-play announcer Eli Gold said Thursday that he is planning on returning to call Alabama football games this September after a year-long health battle that has included about six months spent in hospitals and a nursing home.

Gold missed the 2022 season because of health issues that led to a cancer diagnosis in late December. The 69-year told Mobile’s WNSP radio Thursday that his final chemotherapy session is next Friday.

“Lord willing, and the creek don’t rise, I am planning to be back in time for the start of the regular season,” he said.

Before being diagnosed with cancer, Gold said last November he was aiming to return for Alabama’s spring game April 22. But he confirmed Thursday “that’s not gonna happen” as he continues his treatments. Instead, Gold wants to return to the broadcast booth when Alabama hosts Middle Tennessee State in Bryant-Denny Stadium on Sept. 2.

“I may show up with a walker, and if that’s the case, big darn deal,” he said. “There’s tons of people that use walkers in this world. If I can get by with a cane, I’ll do that. Whatever it is.”

Gold has faced health challenges in recent years, including having both of his shoulders replaced as he continued to announce games in 2020. Gold announced last August he would miss the start of the 2022 season because of unspecified health issues. A month later, Gold said he was “not sick” and instead was dealing with orthopedic issues that required significant weight loss. By November, he revealed he was using a walker and re-learning how to walk.

On Thursday, Gold explained in more detail what happened.

“My legs stopped working way back over a year ago,” he said. “I woke up one morning, and my legs wouldn’t work. I mean, I went to bed — I was walking, I walk into the bedroom. I wake up the next morning, my legs don’t work.”

That led to Gold visiting hospitals in search of a diagnosis, but doctors could not provide one. Gold said he spent time at UAB Hospital six separate times as well as Lakeshore Rehabilitation Hospital, and a skilled nursing facility between Birmingham and Atlanta.

“This is not a shot at anybody at UAB or anybody else,” Gold told WNSP. “It’s just the fact of what it was. They just could not figure out what the deal was. They’d give me steroids to deal with one thing, and well, the steroids was masking something else. It was one of those things where they would say we’ve got to send you home. I would say, we’re not going home without a diagnosis.”

Gold lost considerable weight in the process — a total of 148 pounds, he said Thursday.

“I just had no interest in eating,” he said. “I couldn’t keep anything down. I was sick. The doctors told Claudette, my wife — they told her a couple of times that I might not make it through the night. So I was a very sick boy. Turns out, that I have gotten better. But there’s still work to be done.”

The turning point came in mid-December when Gold had a persistent case of the hiccups.

“I couldn’t each catch my breath,” Gold said. “The doctor, who they brought in to figure this deal out with the hiccups is the one who stumbled upon what that was doing and why that was happening.”

Gold received his cancer diagnosis on Christmas Eve, and began chemotherapy on New Year’s Eve. That has continued over the past three-plus months, with positive feedback from his doctors.

“I’m doing fine,” he told WNSP on Thursday. “It’s not been easy. It’s not been simple, by any stretch. But I do have just one more chemotherapy session to go, and the doctors are really pleased, everybody is excited and if the doctors are pleased, then I’m pleased. I feel wonderful.”

Gold said he has spent 186 days in hospitals and has re-gained some ability to walk. He also is undergoing physical therapy.

“I do walk best with a walker,” he said. “It’s not embarrassing — if you’ve got to use it, you use it. I walk best with a walker. I can walk fairly well with a cane. I can also walk well without either one of them, but nobody really wants me to do that. You know what I’m saying? They’re afraid I’ll take a tumble and then not get up, because my legs are not yet strong enough to lift me. I say to lift me, we all chuckle, but I’m not the [size] guy I used to be.”

The voice of Alabama football since 1988, Gold received phone calls from Nick Saban and athletics director Greg Byrne, and praised the university’s support during his health battle. He also spoke about the role of his wife over the past year.

“The person who is a caregiver, that is one of the toughest jobs in the world — being a caregiver on a long-term basis for somebody that has been ill or is ill,” he said. “Claudette has been spectacular. She’s looked after me. Those 180 days or whatever it is, there was maybe — maybe — a week, one week altogether whenever either she or Elise, our daughter, were not up in the hospital with me. I had friends come up. Thank goodness they brought food for me — not that I would eat it all the time — but it was better than hospital food.”

Chris Stewart — who had his own extended health battle after suffering a stroke in 2018 — replaced Gold for football games last season. But Gold said Thursday his health is headed “in the right direction” after the difficulties of the past year.

“It was awful,” Gold said. “It was scary.”

Mike Rodak is an Alabama beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @mikerodak.